As Hamid Karzai was sworn in as Afghanistan’s president on Thursday, the mood about the man could hardly be more different from when he first emerged to lead the country.

Instead of being celebrated as a person with the stature and credentials to unify and lead, he steps back into office after a fraud-tainted election, to head a government that is steeped in corruption and apparently incapable of halting the Taliban insurgency and violence.

The United States, which once held up Karzai as evidence of progress toward a new, more democratic country, now views its partner with skepticism and is openly leaning on Karzai to clean up the corruption in the government ranks. The U.S. and other NATO countries have said they are weighing the rampant government corruption and mismanagement in decisions on committing more troops.

"There is now a clear window of opportunity for President Karzai and his government to make a new compact with the people of Afghanistan to demonstrate clearly that they're going to have accountability and tangible results that will improve the lives of the people who live throughout this magnificent country," Clinton told employees at the heavily secured U.S. Embassy compound in Kabul.

Early adulation, loss of confidence
The early adulation makes the loss of confidence in Karzai appear all the more dramatic.

When Karzai emerged as the leader of Afghanistan in the wake of the U.S.-led invasion and ouster of the Taliban rulers in 2001, he was seen as having the credentials to unite the ethnically fragmented country and to work with Western forces to improve security.

He had served in the Afghan government immediately after the Soviet occupation and was a member of the majority Pashtun ethnic group, which historically has ruled Afghanistan.

He also was known to Western officials because he had helped to organize opposition to the Soviet occupation in the 1980s and to the Taliban regime in the 1990s from neighboring Pakistan.

The bearded, cape-wearing Karzai also was well educated and English-speaking, and he cut a dashing figure in media appearances — so much so that Gucci designer Tom Ford famously described him as “the chic-est man on the planet” in January 2002.

Doubt about legitimacy
But many Afghans and international observers are not convinced that Karzai is the legitimate winner of August polling. International election observers auditing the vote concluded that Karzai had not won an outright majority. They said that after discounting about 1 million fraudulent ballots, the gap between Karzai and his nearest competitor, former Afghan Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah was narrow enough to require a run-off. That vote never took place because Abdullah bowed out, saying he did not believe there would be a fair election.

Well before the sketchy results, detractors in Afghanistan and abroad were berating Karzai for failing to rein in warlords, drug trafficking and government corruption.

Video: Troop decision
Nor has he had much success in combating the Taliban insurgency. Karzai and his NATO allies have struggled to extend government control beyond Kabul and its immediate environs. The Taliban have capitalized on growing discontent of Afghanistan, and now control much of the countryside while maintaining a strong presence in major cities, such as Kandahar and Ghazni.

Since taking office in January, President Barack Obama and his administration have signaled ambivalence toward the man once heralded as Afghanistan’s greatest hope.

For his part, Karzai has grown increasingly critical of the conduct of the United States and NATO in Afghanistan – especially of the killing of civilians in the war against the Taliban. That is seen, at least in part, as an effort to show that he is not a U.S. puppet, as portrayed by the Taliban.

‘Caught in the middle’
Karzai’s defenders say he has been placed in an impossible situation.

“It’s easy to criticize Karzai,” says Kim Barker, Edward R. Murrow fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a nonpartisan foreign-policy think tank. “But he’s also a man caught in the middle, trapped between the West demanding that he do A, B, and C … and the warlords.”

During the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s, Karzai worked with an exile group in Pakistan seeking to liberate his homeland. He returned after the 1992 Soviet withdrawal and for several turbulent years served as deputy foreign minister in the new Afghan government.

He was briefly allied with the Taliban, but he turned against them when they took control of the government and imposed an extreme brand of Islamic law. Operating once again from Pakistan, Karzai was involved in organizing resistance to the Taliban. He also made frequent trips to Washington to seek U.S. support and to warn of the terrorist threat posed by the Taliban and foreign extremists who had taken refuge in Afghanistan.

After the Sept. 11 attacks on the United States and the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan that toppled the Taliban regime, Karzai was chosen by a traditional council of Afghan elders to be president until 2004, when elections could be held. He was then re-elected for a five-year term in office, which ends this year.

One of the hallmarks of his political style and his survival strategy is his “big-tent” approach — an effort to include all the tribal factions and political rivals in his government.

Outrage over dealsSince 2005, however, he has brought a growing array of unsavory characters into his “tent” — including powerful regional warlords.

In August, in what appeared to be a deal to gain support for his election, Karzai allowed the return of notorious warlord Abdul Rashid Dostum to Afghanistan from his exile in Turkey. Dostum is accused of allowing his men to kill up to 2,000 prisoners captured during the U.S. invasion in 2001 and then hiding evidence of the crime.

Karzai also selected Mohammad Fahim, a former militia chief with a reputation for human rights abuses and corruption, to be his running mate in the presidential race, to the chagrin of many Afghans and Western officials who had urged him to choose someone less controversial.

Karzai has often bristled at the intense international pressure he has come under over corruption in his government. Although he acknowledges his administration faces problems, he has stressed that graft is also pervasive in the international contracting process in Afghanistan and that foreign aid is being wasted before it ever gets to the Afghan people.

The Karzai government unveiled an anti-corruption and major crimes unit last week to signal that he was determined to tackle the issue as international pressure ramps up, including a warning that U.S. military and financial support will be tied to reform.

As for the electoral fraud, if Karzai regretted it, he did not say so.

“This is not the right time to discuss investigations,” he told reporters in early November. “This is the time to move forward toward peace and stability.”

Video: 'Deplorable'

Closed captioning of: 'Deplorable'

>>>tomorrow after his re-election. joining us now from
capitol hill
,
jane harman
, congresswoman harman, just back from
pakistan
and
afghanistan
. thanks so much for being with us at a critical time. you on the ground, you've had a better feel than any of us for what's going on over there. there's been a lot of tension between president
karzai
and the administration, particularly the special respective,
richard holbrook
there under the protection, if you will, of secretary of state clinton today. he hadn't gone back previously for a number of weeks. there's a lot of criticism back and forth. what's your sense on the ground? can
hamid karzai
step up and deliver and clean up the corruption to warrant putting all these additional troops in?

>>i'm pretty pessimistic about this, andrea. i went from, by the way,
pakistan
and
afghanistan
to israel where i said i was much more optimistic about the chance of a palestinian/israeli agreement than i am about a
way forward
in
afghanistan
. i think that the
karzai
record is deplorable. i've been writing articles. i've been on this program talking about it's the corruption, stupid. just today in the "
washington post
" there is the allegation that the minister of minds in
afghanistan
was involved in a $30 million corruption case in which he gave a contract to a chinese company for some mining interests in
afghanistan
. and the president's brother is implicated in some of this. so the record's dismal. the question is whether or not the
karzai
government, which just declared its third anti-corruption
task force
, is going to clean up its act. president
karzai
delivers his
inauguration address
tomorrow. hopefully, he will give us a more concrete idea and name a cabinet in the next days that includes folks who are both competent, ethnically diverse and not corrupt. i didn't see any real signs of this last week when i asked about it. so my
bottom line
is that i'm very, very skeptical that anything like the mcchrystal recommendations make any sense whatsoever in
afghanistan
. if we have no viable partner, no willing partner, and no one to hand off a more stable country to, i agree with our ambassador that we should set out a different strategy.

>>congresswoman, the other piece of this is
pakistan
. you were there. and the leaders in
pakistan
are very nervous that the administration's going to leave them hanging. they don't want us to be withdrawn from the afghan side of the border. they are feeling vulnerable. were you able to reassure them or do you think they've got a legitimate point there in
afghanistan
?

>>well, there are a lot of good efforts going on in
afghanistan
. right now, andrea, both on the military and civil side at lower levels. the bottom up is a positive story. the problem is the top down. the
karzai
government and especially amid wally
karzai
, oun of the brothers of president
karzai
is exercising very negative influence in the kandahar region, which is a region where, for sure, the security situation is deteriorating. i'm not for leaving
afghanistan
. but what i am against certainly if i had to vote today, i would vote no, is committing another 30,000 or 40,000 troops and another $30 billion to $54 billion, with a "b," to solve this problem. it shouldn't be afpac. it needs to be pacaf. they're not blocking the taliban and other groups operating out of the tribal areas from attacking
afghanistan
and potentially our surge in troops. so this is a bad situation for us. my
bottom line
, again, is i'm pretty negative on the mcchrystal recommendations given what
hamid karzai
's performance is. i'd be much more positive on more aid and a more strategic focus to help the pakistanis and to help block
al qaeda
from growing in yemen, somalia, the sudan, the north of africa and the
united states of america
where it obviously is to some small extent. and our goal, obviously, is to prevent more folks like zazi who has been indicted in the
united states
from affiliating with
al qaeda
, training to harm americans.

>>congresswoman, in terms of
pakistan
,
jim jones
, the national security adviser, went over and tried to pressure them to expand their search for the extremists to other regions. do you see any sign they're now willing to take that on as well?

>>i sure hope so. the government is very weak. we met with president zardari and his civilian counterparts. we also met with the intelligence, the director of the
intelligence service
, pasha.
afghanistan
has a bifurcated government, civilian and military. both sides said they intended to do more. problem is that more, at least, seems to translate at present into more to confront the terror threat in their own country. not to confront the terror threat growing out of their country toward
pakistan
and to train westerners to attack the west both in europe and
america
. and they have to do that part, too. otherwise i don't see a stable
way forward
in terms of what threatens us, which is the potential that
al qaeda
or
al qaedacopy cats
can attack
america
in
america
.